Techniques
There are many techniques a player may use in conjunction with basic gameplay. These range from the most basic things any serious player should know, to things that help make a "pro player" a pro. *As well as the techniques listed here, Solfn has a very comprehensive list on the forums you should go check out! **Link: Advanced Tactics Library Advanced techniques should be marked below with , and should be listed at the end of that list. Advanced techniques are those that not everyone can do easily or well, even after being told how, except with much practice or extremely quick reactions. A technique being rarely done does not necessarily make it advanced. Basics General tips and tricks as well helpful information that wouldn't necessarily be known by everyone, but also wouldn't be part of general gameplay. Like all techniques use these in the correct time and place. *'Footing' - Being able to stand in a desirable location can be important, especially when trying to stay as a group. As such it is both import to protect your footing. **with conj platforms - When using conj to fight in the air, people often have on 1 row of blocks below them. If you destroy this, it can potentially drop them to the bottom of the map before they can react. On the flip side, it is important to keep this in mind for yourself, as people may shoot out your platform without even intending to. As such, if you plan on staying in one place for a long time, you may wish to add more conj underneath you. Even if this tactic fails, it can force the other player to continually spawn conj underneath themselves to prevents falling, which can buy time for reinforcements to arrive. **with Flag maps - Flag maps require each team to stand in a certain area to either attack or defend. The flag often starts out with a lot of blocks under it, but often ends up destroyed in the middle with both teams trying to stand on the land left underneath the corner of the flag. Destroying this foothold (even with stray bullets, although this takes longer) often results in many players simply dropping below the flag and never using conj to get back up, and can deal with the conj as mentioned above. *Air jump / High jump - this can allow you to traverse the map quickly without a lot of conj, or can also allow a sniper (or any weapon) to be able to get above a barricade to shoot, and then drop down to safety. *'Vision' - understanding what a player can see around them is important, but so is understanding what they can't. It's important to note that just because you can see them doesn't mean they can see you. **'Vertical' - First of all is vertical sight. While the screen centers around the player, it doesn't center around the center of the player, but instead the head; as such what a player can see above is much more than what they can see below. Using this fact you can sneak up on an enemy easier from below than from above (although keep in mind it's easier to move down than up). **'Horizontal' - Many popular guns pull the camera in the direction the barrel of a gun is facing for a player. While this allows them to better see their targets, it also leaves the less aware from behind, even more so because they are focused on the opposite direction. This can allow you precious seconds to take the upper-hand and attack and potentially capture a point. Conj Conj is most commonly useful for two things: traveling and protection. However, it is also possible to use conj for offense. Traveling with Conj An important part of conj is that the player who places conj collides with it. Traveling focuses on using this aspect of conj. *'Vertical Climbing' - when a player summons conj just above the center of their feet, they will quickly travel upwards without needing to jump or move. This should not be called "flight", as you are standing on conj. *'Speed Walking' - similar to vertical climbing, a player places conj a little ways on top of their character, but this time to the side of their character's feet instead of in the center. *'Offensive Charge' - this builds on speed walking by targeting a specific location held by the other team. This is useful as it can quickly get you into enemy territory, as well as preventing push back from the enemy bullets. It is most commonly used in conjunction with perks (see more in the perks section below). *'Glitching' - glitching as a traveling method is dangerous and unpredictable, but can allow you to travel across a solid part of them map quickly. Glitching has a tendency to send you to the bottom and to the right, and thus it is easier to travel in this direction than in the opposite direction. Any glitching manoeuvre in a different direction will often loop to the right and downwards. * Corner Jump Sliding - uses the idea of conserving forward momentum with minimum conj usage. It is performed by initiating a corner jump, and exploiting temporary icy physics experienced upon ground landing by drawing a path underneath the player in short patches as they travel, so as to avoid losing all forward momentum completely from friction. This technique must be performed without pressing left or right, as the fixed speed of ground walking can interfere with the momentum of the corner jump. A player may jump while performing this technique to gain vertical distance. This technique is not to be mistaken as a series of corner jumps, as only one corner jump is required. Conj Defense Since all conj blocks all bullets and conj blocks all players from the other team, using conj for defense can allow you to defend a spot much longer than normal. *'Shields' - A shield's primary purpose is to block bullets, and potentially prevent opponent getting through. **'Vertical Shield' - A vertical shield involves covering up the body from fire from one side of the screen while allowing for a wall thickness just small enough to poke a gun through to fire back at enemies. While not effective at blocking rapid fire, it is most effective at dealing with sniper fire. **'Horizontal Shield' - A horizontal shield involves covering up the body horizontally in order to block a large number of bullets coming from one particular direction. This allows the player to survive a larger amount of gunfire than by using a vertical shield, but the player will no longer be able to fire back without putting themselves at risk of being counter attacked. A variant of this shield more effective with snipers is a horizontal shield that covers the region of the body below the head while crouching (since the head no longer counts as a hitbox). The height of this horizontal shield is just low enough for the sniper to retaliate with counter fire without experiencing blockages from their conjur. **'Zigzag Shield' - A zigzag shield is used as cover when reloading a weapon. It is drawn by waving the cursor up and down while retreating to create an S shape. This S shape is brittle, only covers for a small amount of gunfire and is usually very easy to break once the player is able to return fire. **'Circle Shield' - A circle shield is a weaker form of shield that temporarily protects the player from all around fire. A shield like this may be used as temporary defence in a flag, or for reloading. A player is not advised to block a large amount of bullets with this shield, as the conj meter runs out quickly. **'Flag Shield' - A flag shield involves surrounding the outside of a flag with conj (much like a large circle shield), but then also filling in the actual flag itself. This will allow your team mates to stand inside, but prevent enemies from quickly getting in. While flag shields are most commonly used by the defensive team, its also important to remember that the attacking team can use them too. If the attacking team has taken control of the flag (not captured), it is important to keep defending units out as they will prevent your capture. So as soon as you take control of a flag, quickly start a shield around the flag before the defending team returns (focusing on the roof of the shield as well as the direction of the enemy spawn). *'Roofing' - While not advanced, this technique requires time, dedication, and a little bit of luck. Roofing is a more offensive type of "shield" that blocks off an area in the air that player would normally travel through. A roof targets a specific spot to block off (usually between two solid landmarks or sometimes above a VIP), and has multiple rows on the map filled with conj over the wide area. Roofing is useful for multiple reasons: it blocks people from moving upwards, people quickly moving upwards may actually be knocked of their conj column (potentially all the way back down), gives the roofing team the advantage of attacking from above (while also having protection), and it can discourage people from even going that way, potentially forcing them to take a less preferred route (as it would take time to remove, and is defended from above). You can also move while repairing it, causing opponents to waist their whole clip without hitting you, allowing you to fire back safely. *'Blocking' - blocking is filling in an open area with the intent to impede the speed at which enemy units can travel through the area. **'Choke points - While any area can be blocked, it is often wise to focus on choke points. Choke points are often spots with a small area to travel through, but can really be any defensible area that can be blocked off that can be used to distract an opponent and buy time. *'Tunnel Filling''' - tunnel filling has two intents: the first is to block people from passing through as specified above, but also is meant to be used by teammates, as they can pass through your conj, even if you cannot. *'Low shield' - This is a type of shield that provides the user protection from enemy fire from below and to the horizontal. It is a wall three blocks tall and as wide as possible without interfering with the player's line of sight of fire. The wall is three blocks tall which exceeds the height of the player's hurt boxes when crouching. It is the most conjuration-efficient form of protection however fails to provide protection from above and when in the recoil state. *'Peephole' - This is a type of shield that grants the user total protection whilst making it easier to poke a weapon through its wall to return fire to an enemy. It is created by offsetting the block fourth lowest from the bottom backwards by one block space. Since the player does not possess any collision hit boxes more than 3 blocks above their feet, the player can walk up to this special vertical shield and easily poke a secondary weapon through the wall to fire at the enemy. Specific weapons such as the Uzi actually cover up the offsetted block whilst the player is firing. Since this happens, it appears to the enemy as if you have left a single hole in your shield when in fact you are still completely protected - thus, it also acts as a form of trickery especially to Snipers. *'Buffered Shield ' - A special type of shield designed specifically to eliminate the effects of ping that increase the likelihood that the user will be hit by return fire during their recoil time. It is designed to accompany a vertical shield to produce a defense so impregnable that it cannot be countered by even the speed of human reflexes. This technique is performed by filling in the line of sight between the enemy's weapon and your hit boxes with conjuration directly in front of yourself at the soonest possible moment after opening fire. If performed within 10 frames (or about 0.167 seconds), the shield's hit boxes will activate giving you protection before the enemy can react. It is most effective against defending from sniper fire. Conj Offense Conj offense purely focuses on the fact that conj is solid to players of the opposing team. *'Pushing' - pushing is the act of actually spawning conj against an enemy unit, and forcing them off their current spot. This is often done on flag maps, or pushing away kamikaze bombers (see perk section below) before they can plant a bomb. *'Blocking' - uses the idea that a good offense is a good defense. While blocking is a defensive technique, what makes it offensive is how you use it. Offensive blocking is often used on flag maps and at spawn points, and uses the idea that by blocking enemy units in a easily defended location even before they reach their destination allows your team time to capture / begin setting up a defense around the target. *Glitching - because players on one team collide against the conj of the other team, it is possible to use conj to glitch an opponent through a solid part of the map, with the intent of sending them into the void and their death. Note that glitching is unpredictable and may not do what you want. Glitching in an offensive manner is often frowned upon and considered in bad taste. *'Capturing (A.K.A the "Fishing Net")' - This is a special kind of structure used to counter enemies who glitch through walls as a method of approach. It is performed by coating the right and top side of walls with a layer of conjuration with a 2 or 3 block gap in between them. Since glitching is much more easily performed by travelling to the right, any player travelling right will end up caught inside the net once they appear from the wall and will be temporarily caught off guard and unable to move allowing the player to retaliate by making the first strike instead of the prospective glitcher. Perks There are many things you can do with perks beyond what they do in normal situations, as well as some techniques that can be done by using 2 perks at once. *''' C4 / Mine''' **'Safeguard' - if you want to keep someone away from a certain area, dropping C4 or a Mine can be a great deterrent. Keep in mind that both of these will disappear after 2 minutes if not activated. **'Kamikaze' - This involves dropping down into a group of people and placing an explosive, often dying in the process. ***plus Shelter - Instead of having to worry about dying before you can get in the target area or before you place the explosive, using the shelter perk can give you enough time to get in and place the explosive, often with a second to spare. ***plus conj - after placing an explosive, you can prevent targets from moving away by quickly trapping them with conj. This can be especially useful when attempting this with a VIP. **'Hidden Surprise' (Mine) - It is possible to make a mine hard to see if your not looking for it, especially on certain maps. ***On flag maps, a good spot is right under the shield / swords icon. People rushing to capture the flag may not spot this until it's to late. ***On darker maps, your conj may appear nearly black to an enemy, so if you place a mine and then cover it with conj, it may be next to impossible to see. Map examples: Space and Jungle. **'Landing Blast' - Most common with the mine, this technique can be done by placing an explosive at a point below an enemy's sight range where you know they will drop down. Since they are falling, they will have much less time to react and stay out of your explosive's reach. This can be useful on almost every map mode; domination and VIP by tunneling straight down and leaving an explosive at the bottom or in the actual drop down, and on some flag maps by putting one above flag to prevent people from attempting to kamikaze. **plus Rage - while not the most obvious combo, this is potentially the most deadly. This combo uses that fact that Rage increase the damage of all attacks, even explosions. This combo is especially useful with mines, as while normally mines cannot kill someone with full health, if you have the Rage perk active when they trigger the mine, everyone in the blast radius will be dead (unless crouching or under the influence of another perk with enough health left to withstand the blast). * Shelter & Health Pack - Need to defend a point a little longer? As long as you don't take too much damage - either because of not to many attackers or having adequate cover (potentially conj) - you can offset a good portion of the damage taken even with the Shelter perk with the healing with the Health Pack. Crouching helps even more. *'Support' - while using perks in this way isn't hard to do, it can greatly enhance how well your team performs, especially on some maps. Keep in mind that you can change perks during gameplay (albeit with a triggered cool-down), so you don't have to use these perks all the time. ** Medic! - The most up-front of the support perk techniques, this is performed by dropping a Health Pack were people may need it most, often in a group of people, but it can also be in an advantageous location your team has just taken, not only healing people in the area, but often drawing other players to that spot. ** Rage & Shelter - While these perks aren't often all that great on their own, using these on a group of people can turn the tide in a firefight. **''' C4 / Mine''' - See the "Safeguard" technique above. ** Shelter - while not often though as a support perk, this perk can be used to protect all your allies in a firefight. Rather than hiding behind everyone else with the person in front taking heavy damage, you can active this perk, and run out in front. If you go a few block in front of your team, it can allow your team to not only shoot safely but advance forward, getting even more hits, and possibly driving the enemy back. Note that if the firefight is very large, this may not be advised, as even with the Shelter perk you may die nearly instantly. ***with conj - Because bullets push you back, in heavy firefights you might not be able to move forward. You can keep yourself being pushed back by placing conj right behind you. If you place it correctly, you may even be able to propel yourself forward. ***going above - another way to keep yourself from being pushed back to soon is to get above the bullets and dropping down into the middle of the firefight. Other Not all techniques fit nicely in other sections; however, this doesn't mean they are any less important and should be listed here. *'Psychology' - While human minds are very complex and can do amazing things, they also are in some ways malleable and predictable. To that end, it is possible to manipulate / trick other players to do what you want (especially less experienced / unfocused ones). However not everyone reacts the same to every situation, and more advance players will know to look out for these and are less susceptible. As such, they should be used at the player's discretion, and require a bit of luck, as well as "reading" of the target(s). Note that these tactics are not black-and white, and can be used in a variety of different ways. **'Round-about digging' - Normally players will dig in straight lines as it's quickest. However, if you create a tunnel players will often follow it even if it takes long / is a nuisance. Oddly enough many players will do this when re-digging a tunnel that been filled with conj. This concept can be used advantageously in a few ways: ***Don't always follow the road most traveled; feel free to create your own path, even if it ends up in the same place as another. ***If you don't need to quickly travel back along it, creating tunnels that cause followers to waste time / but them in an awkward spot can be advantageous ***Take one for the team; if you see a problem like this disrupting your team, take the time to fix it; remove an obstacle, or create a better path. **'If you can't beat them, join them / see things through others' eyes' - It is common for people to get upset and annoyed when others do things they dislike. While finding ways to nullify these tactics is important, it can also be a good idea to try them yourself. While some aspects of gameplay can be purely griefing, many techniques that annoy you can also be turned to your advantage. This can be done by doing it yourself, or finding out what the pros of the technique is, and find out how to exploit it and use it against them. **'Fight or Flight' - while shooting and advancing on a target is good, surprise attacks can be better. When you surprise someone and do something unexpected, they may act in unexpected ways. If a player drops down into an enemy's base and plants a bomb, people will often run from that spot. However, they don't always look where they are going, or think about why that spot was so important. This type of scare tactic can also be used against an equally powerful force (even 1 vs 1) by one team suddenly advancing forward, causing the other team to either shoot it out then and there, or retreat and play it safe. Like any psychological trick, this involves some risk / luck, as well as reading your opponent(s). **'Let the enemy do the work' - While this is a game that require quick thinking and reflexes, many players forget to also think simple actions through. The most obvious of these is to shoot at an enemy. An example would be a player destroying their own shield to shoot someone, or a player blindly shooting a moving enemy until they run out of ammo, and then the enemy player using this as an opportunity to walk right up to them and finish them off. While it's good to not put yourself in certain situations like these, using these reactions against others can be advantageous and amusing. An example would be instead of firing at a location with multiple enemies and shields, use conj / perks / movement to defend while waiting for them to run out of ammo and destroy their own shield, and then using that moment to your advantage, with your fully loaded gun. See Also *Solfn's "Advanced Tactics Library" - http://atelier801.com/topic?f=8&t=765840 *Glitching Category:Content